Research On Economic Benefits And Environmental Impact Assessment Of Waste-to-energy

This research focuses on a feasibility analysis of municipal solid waste (MSW) power plant in southern area of Chiang Mai province. The study is divided in to 3 parts, (1)potential analysis considered from quantity and contents of the MSW including available MSW to energy conversion technologies.(2)environmental impacts assessment.(3)economic feasibility considering from the electricity production cost.For the potential analysis in term of quantity and contents, the results show that the waste generation rate of the area is approximately 450 tons/year. The waste regularly consists of 63.15 percent food waste,5.9 percent paper,16.8 percent plastic,8.17 percent glass,1.09 percent metal,0.34 percent textile,1.03 percent leaf and 4 percent others. For the first technology, incineration technology, after the waste is collected and sorted, the combustible waste will be burned in the boiler to produce steam for steaming power plant turbine, the maximum capacity of the power plant is 7.85MW. For the anaerobic digestion technology and landfill technology, the waste is digested to produce methane gas and then the gas is used as fuel for the engine coupling with the electricity generator. The maximum capacity of the anaerobic digestion technology power plant is 2.89MW while the landfill technology power plant is 0.93MW. However, when considering about the economic feasibility, it could be found that the electricity generation cost of the landfill technology power plant is the lowest. It is approximately 2.07 baht/kWh while the costs of the incineration technology power plant and the anaerobic digestion technology power plant are as high as 8.9 baht/kWh and 6.8 baht/kWh, respectively. The technique is not considered only the energy potential, economic feasibility and environmental impact but also social impact and social acceptability. The weighting factor is obtained from the opinions of 4239 stakeholders including people who living in the studied area, government officers involving the energy project, energy specialists, researchers and professionals.When considering the environmental impacts by life cycle assessment technique, it could be found that the impacts of incineration power plant is the highest. They include global warming, acidification and eutrophication. Following by the landfill power plant, the impact includes global warming, eutrophication and acidification.. The anaerobic digestion power plant causes the lowest impacts. Since the quantity of environmental impacts. It is could be converted to the currency unit by using the environmental externality concepts, the environmental external costs for each power plant are 2.3 baht/kWh,1.69 baht/kWh and 1.44 baht/kWh, respectively.Since the technology selection should base on all aspects base on all aspects but the results for each part are different, the weighting technique is also applied in this research to find the most suitable technology for the studied area.This research used the theory of sustainable development by the comprehensive ecological economy and society. To the garbage power plant project by the sustainable development analyze in the Southern Chiang Mai area. Comparison waste energy, economics Cost effectiveness and environmental impacts. The result was the electricity garbage landfill system have the most value that showed in the graph of power plant from garbage landfill projects side 40 years. Moreover, this research also analyzes the trend of electricity production from waste system project to the next 80 years for analysis the possibility of sustainable development.The results show that the most suitable technology for electricity generation which can support all aspects is the landfill technology following by the incineration technology and the anaerobic digestion technology, respectively.